SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL 2023 REVIEW! With Pianoforte, Director Jakub Piątek has composed a genuine piece of art, not unlike a piece of music. It has style. It has sensitivity. It has risks. But at its heart, Pianoforte is a poignant rumination on life.
The documentary chronicles the 2021 Chopin Piano Competition—or, as it is likened in the film, the Olympics of Piano—held every five years in Warsaw, Poland. Not only is it a grueling 21-day contest of skill, but it is also the most prestigious piano competition in the world. In an interview with Sundance, Piątek explained that it was an instinctual choice to focus the film on the competition’s younger pianists. That instinct paid off. It is a marvel to follow them through three brutal rounds of performance, especially considering their age. China’s Hao Rao is a carefree soul when he’s not constantly pushed to practice by his teacher. The Russian-Armenian Eva Gevorgyan is as close to a savant as can be conceived, every aspect of her life and image tuned to the piano. Leonora Armellini is as outgoing and beautifully spoken as one would expect from an Italian, but she also listens to Metallica in her spare time. There are many more, each of them a character.
Marcin Wieczorek appears in Pianoforte by Jakub Piątek, an official selection of the World Documentary Competition at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Darek Golik. All photos are copyrighted and may be used by the press only for the purpose of news or editorial coverage of Sundance Institute programs. Photos must be accompanied by a credit to the photographer and/or ‘Courtesy of Sundance Institute.’ Unauthorized use, alteration, reproduction or sale of logos and/or photos is strictly prohibited.
“…chronicles the 2021 Chopin Piano Competition—or, as it is likened in the film, the Olympics of Piano…”
Moreover, Pianoforte is a supremely confident film. It trusts its audience to draw their own insight from its many moments of intimacy. Often the film says very little at all—it never explains what is at stake for these young competitors. It simply allows their words, as well as the atmosphere of the competition, to shape a magnificently understated ideal of excellence—an ideal that is different for every competitor but is communally worth pursuing. As with life, these characters are not simple, but they are human. We understand the toll of that excellence when one of the competitors resigns, wishing for just a few days away from the crucible of the piano, but when that same competitor is shown later as distant—and when the audience is shown in tears at the performance of others—we understand that excellence is not an isolated ideal, but one connected and deeply inspirational.
Yet, Pianoforte’s strongest technical feat is its pace. The footage is inquisitively shot and assembled to allow ample emotional breathing room. There is almost zero editorializing, and we are enabled to fully engage with the pianists and their experience—from the vertiginous stress before they perform to the anxiety of waiting for results. Pianoforte watches like the offspring of Somm and Whiplash—intense, rewarding, but always with levity.
The term pianoforte (the original name of our well-known piano) translates to “soft-loud” in Italian. Nothing better describes the film. It is, at times, a gauntlet of will and endurance. At other times it is a gentle rumination on coming-of-age, but it is always incisive and always a journey, one that lingers long after the credits disappear. However, Pianoforte’s greatest revelation is that all great things, adored as they are, also come with great difficulty, both soft and loud.
Pianoforte screened at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival.